Browning BAR and FN mags

Manoa-Fisherman

To Beantown:

Will the FN magazines fit only the Hog Stalker version of the BAR, or will it also work in other versions? If so, which versions. Also, if it works for 308, will it work for other short cartridges like th 243 or 7mm-08? Thanks for the advice!

beantownshootah

Will the FN magazines fit only the Hog Stalker version of the BAR, or will it also work in other versions? If so, which versions. Also, if it works for 308, will it work for other short cartridges like th 243 or 7mm-08? Thanks for the advice!
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Again, I don't own any of these, I'm just reporting what others are saying.

Per the mag SELLERS, the Browning BAR MK II 2, LongTrac, BPR, and Safari all use the same magazines.

The older ("Mk I") BAR rifles made between 1968 and 1993 use a different magazine.

The BAR shorttrac uses a short internal detachable hunting type magazine on a hinged floorplate. If I have this right (and someone else please correct me if I don't), that's three different types of BAR rifle, each with their own magazines.

Hog Stalker is basically a shorttrac action, but with a vertical pistol grip, camo, and other bells and whistles. This one was clearly designed to take detachable high-cap mags. The other short-trac rifles weren't.

So without hearing different from someone who has actually done it, my assumption (ie educated guess) is that you CANNOT use high cap FNAR type mags in non Hog-stalker BAR rifles, at least not right out of the box.

Despite that, it *might* be possible to modify the short-trac rifles to get this to work. Well. . .I'm sure its "possible", I'm just not sure how "practical" (ie "easy" or "cost effective".) If all you had to do was take off the rifle mag floorplate, or maybe that plus slightly tweak the magazine, or maybe ream out a little bit of wood that could be pretty easy. Again, I don't know. . .but I kind of think its NOT that easy.

On calibers, every Browning .308 magazine is also listed as the .243 magazine. So I think its fair to say .308 and .243 mags are interchangeable within a given platform. On the other hand, at least for current production guns, Browning lists 7mm-08 as a different magazine with a different catalog number. See here:

http://tinyurl.com/ohanzo2

So 7mm-08 is a different magazine.

Note that this doesn't mean you definitely can't get away with a .308 magazine in a 7mm-08 gun, or vice versa, just that the mags are at the very least optimized for each round. Again, I honestly don't know what the spec differences are here, or even if you can get the different magazines to "fit" in the wrong gun.

You'd have to try it and see.

Maybe this would work OK. . .maybe it would work OK for only certain length/types of ammo. Maybe it would work, but you'd get poor reliability. Maybe it would work one way, but not the other (EG mag caliber X works in gun caliber Y, but mag Y won't run in gun X).

Hope that helped a little bit.

Manoa-Fisherman

Beantown:

Thank you very much for your exhaustive and comprehensive answer to my question. I really appreciate you sharing your knowledge and expertise for guys like me who look to those who have the knowledge and are willing to share it with us.